Everything You Need to Know About All 23 Art Fairs at Art Basel Miami Beach

At the entrance to the pavilions for Art Miami and CONTEXT Art Miami, don't miss the Deep Sea Project, an interactive installation by artists Tina Spiro, Edouard Duval-Carrie, and Jacek Kolasinski. Courtesy of Art Miami.

As you might expect, there are many, many art fairs taking place around the 2017 edition of Art Basel in Miami Beach, and deciding which ones to visit can be a daunting task.

When one fair folds, another reliably rises in its place. This year, X Contemporary, the woman-owned Conception Art Fair, Next Level Fairs‘ Art Concept, and Technique Art Fair have all gone the way of the dodo, and Miami Project appears to be on hiatus until 2018. Meanwhile, 2017’s newcomers include an all-women operation—dubbed Fair—and the design fair Form.

To help you navigate the never-ending stream of art, artnet News has compiled our go-to guide to Art Basel Miami Beach and its army of satellite fairs.

Art Basel Public 2016. Photo courtesy of Art Basel in Miami Beach.

1. Art Basel in Miami Beach (see last year’s report)
The main affair has an intimidating 268 international galleries on tap for its 2017 edition, plus plenty of programming, including a screening of Sara Driver’s Boom For Real: The Late Teenage Years of Jean-Michel Basquiat (2017) and the always-popular Public sector in Collins Park, organized this year by independent curator and critic Philipp Kaiser.

The new location for Art Miami and CONTEXT Art Miami (rendering). Image courtesy of Art Miami.

2. Art Miami (see last year’s report)
It’s the 28th edition of Art Miami, the city’s longest-running Miami Art Week fair, now taking place in a new location downtown. Along with its two sister fairs, Context and Aqua, the Art Miami empire brings close to 300 international galleries to town. At the fair’s entrance, don’t miss the Deep Sea Project, an interactive installation by artists Tina Spiro, Edouard Duval-Carrié, and Jacek Kolasinski, sponsored by the MiART Foundation. Housed in three shipping containers, the piece is meant to raise awareness of climate change and the importance of marine conservation.

3. NADA Miami Beach (see last year’s report)
The 15th edition of NADA Miami Beach, the only major nonprofit-run fair, is decamping from the Deauville Beach Resort, still recovering from the combined effects of an electrical fire and Hurricane Irma, to its former digs at the Ice Palace. Don’t miss a selection of 25 artist-designed record sleeves on display from Merge Records, which will be accompanied by an acoustic performance from indie rock band Superchunk at 4 p.m. on Thursday, December 7. Special projects include Shimizu Brand’s portrait studio, where visitors can get a photo from Josh Brand and Trevor Shimizu in exchange for a donation to the Miami charity Lotus House, and an augmented reality installation—viewable only via smartphone app—from Sarah Derate and Rachel McRae.

4. Untitled, Miami Beach (see last year’s report)Untitled continues to grow, bringing a record 137 dealers to its beachfront tent for its sixth edition. Omar Lopez-Chahoud has curated the fair’s special projects, which include a restaging of Gordon Matta-Clark’s Garbage Wall, originally created for the first Earth Day, in 1970. The mixed-media piece, made from garbage collected on Miami Beach, has been assembled by the artist’s estate with students from the Florida International University Honors College.

5. PULSE Miami Beach (see last year’s report)
This will be PULSE’s first edition under former Armory Show director Katelijne De Backer, most recently of Art New York and Aqua Art Miami, following the departure of Helen Toomer. Don’t miss the special projects, which include Recent Activity, Jeana Eve Klein’s fabric works detailing her failures to move beyond social media activism into real-world action; and Firscher Cherry’s glorified display of women’s fertility drugs, inspired by her own autoimmune disease-inflicted infertility and women’s increased use of artificial reproductive technology.

6. Scope Miami Beach (see last year’s report)
Known for everpresent references to pop culture, SCOPE returns for its 17th outing in Miami with 130 exhibitors from 25 countries and 60 cities. Filipe Pantone has been tasked with creating a site-specific installation for the fair’s atrium, a hanging sculpture he’s calling “a three-dimensional gradient computer glitch.” Scope’s slate of VIP panel discussions includes a conversation with NBA star and art collector Amar’e Stoudemire and “Feminist Art for a New Era: Harnessing the Power of Art in the Fight for Women’s Equality,” sponsored by artnet and moderated by this reporter.

7. Satellite Art Show (see last year’s report)
Satellite, run by artist and former Select founder Brian Whiteley, launched in 2015 at a variety of locations in North Beach, featuring immersive, experimental, and sometimes participatory work. It moved to a more central location near Aqua for its second year, but is returning to the abandoned Ocean Terrace Hotel for its third edition, in part to offer its exhibitors more affordable rates. Be sure to catch Pink Privacy, a performance from artist Jessica Yatrofsky—named after her new poetry volume—and her collective the NY Fem Factory.

8. Design Miami (see last year’s report)
Design Miami welcomes 31 leading design galleries to its 13th edition, including first-timers Converso, of New York; Lebreton of San Francisco; and Maison Gerard, of New York. The fair’s programming will take part in the Design Talks Theater, a functional design installation from LOT Architecture founders Eleni Petaloti and Leonidas Trampoukis, dubbed Spectacle.

9. No Commission
Hip hop star Swizz Beatz launched No Commission, his roving “art and music experience” that gives 100 percents of all sales proceeds to artists, in Miami in 2015. After outings in Berlin, Shanghai, London, and the Bronx, it’s returning to Florida for Miami Art Week. The theme is “Island Might,” focusing on North American and Caribbean artists including Renee Cox, Derrick Adams, Ebony G. Patterson, Shinique Smith, and Kehinde Wiley.

10. Fair.
An art fair in a shopping mall might sound like a tough sell, but we’re intrigued by Fair., a non-commercial venue featuring only women artists—the idea is to “smash the modern-day patriarchy” with a message of gender and race equality. Zoe Lukov, director of exhibitions for Faena Art, and Anthony Spinello of Miami’s Spinello Projects serve as co-curators. Among the promised works of art are Yoko Ono’s participatory Wish Tree activation and billboards by the Guerrilla Girls.

11. Context Art Miami (see last year’s report)
Context, founded in 2012, is accompanying its sister fair Art Miami in its move downtown. Highlights at the new location will include a little something for the younger set: the fair pavilion will feature a multi-sensory interactive art installation aimed at children ages 3 to 13 from Young at Art Museum. Visitors will also be greeted by OPHELIA, an architectural, interdisciplinary live performance incorporating video sculpture by Nadja Marcin, presented by New York’s Jaeckel Gallery. The piece will draw on masterworks from art history—such as John Everett Millais’s painting of the same name—to critique the negative effects of human activity on the planet.

12. Aqua Art Miami (see our 2014 report)
Miami’s long-running hotel fair, known for showcasing the work of emerging artists, is back for a 12th edition, with 52 exhibitors. A selection of projects on the theme of art and fashion will include a 16-foot-tall monkey sculpture by Laura Kimpton, of Burning Man fame, presented by New York’s HG Contemporary; and a fully functional tattoo parlor from Thea Duskin, known for her watercolor tattoos, presented by Richmond’s Ghostprint Gallery. Sessions cost $500.

13. Form Miami
Miami’s first fair for applied arts and sculpture objects launches this year from Urban Expositions, producers of SOFA Chicago, Art Aspen, and Art Palm Springs. An invitation-only affair with 25 international galleries, Form hopes to create a boutique experience during the hustle and bustle of Miami Art Week.

15. Superfine! The Fairest Fair
Now in its third year, Superfine expanded to New York in 2017, with plans to launch in Washington, DC, in October and Los Angeles in January 2019. A self-described “artist-forward oasis,” Superfine aims to offer a more accessible selection of work from 46 international exhibitors, all priced under $10,000, and 70 percent between $200 and $4,000. Highlights will include a garden hosting installation art, nightly musical performances, and a short film series curated by South Florida-based LGBTQ film festival OUTshine. LGTBQ artists will also be highlighted at the fair itself, while Dolphins Plus Marina Mammal Rescue will sell abstract paintings created by the aquatic mammals, to benefit conservation efforts.

16. Art Africa Miami Art Fair
Focusing on artists of the African diaspora, the 2017 edition of Art Africa, titled “Back to Black: No On/Off Ramps,” has doubled in size. It will feature 25 artists from the US, Africa, Europe, the Caribbean, and Latin America.

17. Pinta Miami
Featuring Latin American, Spanish, and Portuguese art, Pinta will feature sections for Brazilian, Peruvian, and Argentinean art this time around, with a theme of “Errant Geographies.” A new section, Pinta Platforms, showcasing Modern and contemporary art, will be organized by curator Roc Laseca.

18. Fridge Art Fair
Fridge—the name is a play on Frieze—holds its fifth Miami edition, titled Art Bagel. The fair kicked things off early with a Sunday night opening and will close at the week’s end with a “Clean the Fridge Bagel Brunch.” New for 2017, founder Eric Ginsburg is introducing a Doggie Wall of Fame featuring his canine paintings.

19. Spectrum Miami
Spectrum, a juried contemporary art show, along with its fair-within-a-fair ArtSpot Miami International Art Fair and smaller sister fair Red Dot, are located in Miami’s new arts and entertainment district, between Downtown Miami and Wynwood. The entrance will feature Our Path, a monumental, nature-inspired, laser-carved outdoor sculpture from James West of Studio Wild West.

20. The New Red Dot Art Fair
The curatorial theme for the 12th edition of Red Dot is “impact,” covering the influence art can have on society. Mexican engineer Ricardo Cárdenas, for example, will display paintings made on concrete building materials salvaged from the recent Mexico City earthquake.

21. Miami River Art Fair
The Miami River Fair’s principal selling point is its 10,000 square feet of exhibition space along the banks of the Miami River, where it hosts a monumental sculpture walk each year. There’s also an indoor component, with booths for galleries and artists, as well as special projects.

22. Prizm Art Fair
If you are hanging around Miami into next week, note that Prizm is a two-week affair, showing the work of over 40 African and African diaspora artists. The fair is also taking over the Betsy Orb, an architectural element wedged between two Miami Beach hotels, projecting artwork on the passageway December 7–10.

23. Art Beat Miami Art Fair
For the fourth year, Little Haiti Optimist Foundation and Northeast Second Avenue Partnership are partnering on a fair in Little Haiti. Curated by Pulitzer Prize–winning Miami Herald photojournalist Carl Juste, the event will showcase emerging and established artists, with a focus on Haiti and the Caribbean.